I was hoping for Gretchen Whitmer or Tammy Baldwin, or if there really was some kind of requirement that it had to be a Black woman, I would have preferred Susan Rice. That said, I think it would’ve been a horrible mistake to pick Elizabeth Warren, Karen Bass, or Tammy Duckworth, so I’m relieved we dodged those bullets and overall I’m fine with it.
Perry Bacon Jr. on the 538 Podcast said a few days ago that all the vocal Black figures who kept doing TV hits and writing columns saying Biden absolutely had to pick a Black woman actually meant he had to pick Harris because they didn’t see any other Black women as truly qualified (none are senators or governors) but they couldn’t say it out loud. So it may be that the fix was really in on this more than we ever knew.
I think Biden originally wanted to take Klobuchar but then when she was out he wanted to take Whitmer, and then when everyone insisted so strenuously it had to be a Black woman he wanted to take Rice, but in the end felt he had to take Harris.
I have not seen anyone, in all the voluminous “veepstakes” commentary I have read/heard/seen, note the (unintended) influence of two men in leading Biden to this decision:
Bernie Sanders. I firmly believe the main reason Biden made the promise to pick a woman at the last Democratic debate was that he knew the race was almost over and he wanted to pre-empt any chorus from the left that the only fair choice would be second place finisher Bernie. Some pundits have said he needlessly boxed himself in, but IMO they are missing the fact that he wanted to be boxed in! Or at least to have Bernie boxed out in a way no one could criticize him for. Pretty clever.
Derek Chauvin. I’m sure Harris is as repulsed by Chauvin as most of us are, but I’m convinced that if he had not knelt on George Floyd’s neck, we would have a Biden-Klobuchar or maybe Biden-Whitmer ticket.
David Axelrod believes it was actually the Biden campaign that leaked Gretchen Whitmer’s interview, as a trial balloon. If that’s true, we can add one more factor to the list helping Harris: the swarm of angry commentary we got from the Black chattering classes over the prospect of Whitmer. So even close to the end of the process, they may have been really wanting to take Whitmer (who I think would have been the smartest pick), but they needed to feel like there was only a low rumble of dissent rather than an angry roar. Of course, they got the latter, which may well have been decisive in scuttling Whitmer. If so, I guess I have to tip my hat to that group of chatterers for really exerting influence at a crucial moment. Unlikely we will ever know for sure, but it’s a huge pivot point in history so I hope we find out more.
Paul Begala pointed out that the qualification for becoming a Democratic veep has, for the past 40 years, been running for president yourself first and failing colossally. (Let’s just hope that this pattern does not continue to ultimately losing the presidency in the electoral college despite winning the popular vote.)
You haven’t seen anyone mention George Floyd and the BLM protests as a driving factor in Biden’s selection? Because I’m not sure I’ve seen any commentary that didn’t mention that as a factor. Is your quibble that they usually use George Floyd’s name instead of the perpetrator?
I suppose people say “in this current climate”, or that kind of thing. But it was the actions of Chauvin, something he could have and should have not done, that ultimately led in this direction.
But still, I wrote that awkwardly because I started by mainly just talking about Bernie and then expanded it and left my verbiage a little too absolutist. I definitely have not seen anyone talk about the promise to pick a woman being about stiff-arming Bernie, even though that strikes me as a pretty obvious inference.
Just want to apologize for an incorrect post above. I stated that Harris was raised in the US. She actually lived in Canada from age 12 until she went to college. I apologize for not knowing this. Now the Republicans can all start complaining that she is actually Canadian.
Most folks that knew Biden said that Whitmer would be a surprise because he didn’t know her. And Biden’s notion of the Vice Presidency is someone he can closely work with. That’s why Harris and Rice were high in the end - because they were qualified and were pretty friendly with Biden. Whitmer was one of 11 interviewees and it seems like that is how far she went.
Can you point to anything - anything at all - to back up this unique insight into Biden’s thinking? Otherwise I might be tempted to think you projected your own preferences onto Biden.
It’s too bad all those Black chatterers swarmed - otherwise you could have gotten your choice! Womp womp.
He interviewed Whitmer in person, so he was obviously interested in her. Not to mention that it’s common sense for him to want someone who can help him shore up one of the states that crucially flipped from Obama to Trump.
And before Klobuchar got tainted by Chauvin’s murder of Floyd and took herself out of the running, he showed many signs of having her as his top choice (in fact, it looked like he made her something close to a promise to pick her as veep in exchange for her endorsement right before Super Tuesday, with that big rally they held together). It has also been widely reported that Rice is who Biden had the most rapport with and felt would be the strongest governing pick. Have you really not seen any of that?
As for the “womp womp”: yes, I would have preferred Whitmer or Rice. But Harris is far, far better than Warren, Duckworth, or Bass–so I’m not nearly as disappointed as you seem to think I am.
Trump’s acolytes are used to accepting claims that have no support whatsoever. So they will happily believe that Kamala is simultaneously a reactionary that no one on the left should support, and more radically left-wing than Bernie ever thought of being.
But the GOP attacks on both Biden and Harris are weaker than their usual standard. There’s literally no there, there. And this will bother some of the fuzzy middle, those not deeply engaged in politics and not either far-right or far-left. Those folks, seeing how off-target the attacks on the Dem ticket really are, will be wondering if the Republicans are able to get anything right.
(Of course Trump’s disastrous pandemic response, er, trumps everything. Nothing anyone decides to believe about Kamala can outweigh Trump’s inertia and/or outright sabotaging of US pandemic healthcare.)
At a personal level every South Asian is, and should be proud of Kamala’s accomplishment, as far as I know. I am too.
That does not mean every Indian-American will vote for Kamala. For example : Some Hindu Indian Americans may not vote for her because of her stance on Kashmir, some Christian Indian Americans may not vote for her because they care more about abortion, some Muslim Indian Americans may not vote for her because of the issues on homosexuality, many Indian-Americans are business owners and they care more about taxes and may not vote for her …
The criticism goes on the same lines as some White authors writing stories for the black person.
Don’t assume all brown people are the same. Don’t assume all South-Asian people are the same either. We have much nuanced differences that white people don’t get.
Just like Irish Americans have their nuances, so do Indian-Americans, numbers not withstanding.
So, you said Whitmer was his first choice (after Klobuchar dropped out) and your evidence for that is that:
He interviewed her in person.
She’s from Michigan.
Seems like an open and shut case to me!
(And yes, I do remember all the reporting about Klobuchar’s endorsement, but that’s not what I’m commenting on.)
As for Rice, I have seen a lot of discussion about her rapport with Biden since they worked together for many years. I, too, felt that would likely be a point in her favor. But this is what you said:
If he had the best rapport with Rice and wanted to pick her, why did he “have to” pick Harris?
Regarding the choice of Harris and her educational history, it’s nice to see Montreal getting referenced in presidential politics in something other than the Montreal Cognitive Assessment test.
Yeah no one said that, but you’d have to be really burying your head in the sand if you don’t think the South Asians who are excited about a South Asian VP won’t be extra enthusiastic to get to the polls. There is a reason black turnout was so high when Obama was on the ticket.
It really doesn’t matter; Indian-Americans are a tiny, tiny minority so their votes aren’t going to throw the election. They are wealthier than average, though, so perhaps their money might help.
Let me throw in an anecdote. My children are mixed-race persons of color. They knew Obama as our president and that he’s a mixed-race person of color. They know Kamala as our senator and that she’s a mixed-race person of color. These are politicians they see themselves in. Policy is important, but representation matters.
(Let’s just hope that this pattern does not continue to ultimately losing the presidency in the electoral college despite winning the popular vote.)